


Don't Call Me Sweetheart

by Enchantedtalisman



Category: Mass Effect - All Media Types, Mass Effect: Andromeda
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, BAMF Female Ryder | Sara, BAMF Male Ryder | Scott, Eventual Romance, Eventual Smut, Implied Consensual Body Modifications, M/M, Self-Indulgent
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-24
Updated: 2020-04-12
Packaged: 2021-02-28 20:40:28
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,748
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23293384
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Enchantedtalisman/pseuds/Enchantedtalisman
Summary: Scott wakes up and everything...hurts. His head, his body. Shoot it feels like his amp isn't doing what it's meant too or rather that it's doing it...better? The sudden absence of that pressure must be why...
Relationships: Male Ryder | Scott/Reyes Vidal
Comments: 1
Kudos: 9





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Another wip! woot. Honestly just be glad I don't post *every* single wip that I write down. Or I'd have like 300+ fics on here.
> 
> Anyway I just...really wanted a bad ass Ryder. I also don't like a few things in canon so I'm gonna mess around a bit.
> 
> Enjoy <3

Scott wakes up and everything...hurts. His head, his body. Shoot it feels like his amp isn't doing what it's meant too or rather that it's doing it...better? The sudden absence of that pressure must be why...

"Ryder?" One of the doctors, what was his name? Carlyle, asks with a concerned expression.

"Here." Scott says belatedly and ignores his sister's giggle from across him. "Sorry."

"It's mostly fine, I need to make sure to scan your brain again, I'm a little concerned at how long it took you to respond." Carlyle barely waits for the words to come out of his mouth before his arm that has his omni-tool (and even _that_ looks new and like the design team went through five different models, maybe more) and starts scanning.

"Oh don't worry doctor, he probably just realized his amps different." Sara says with a smile.

Without meaning too, Scott smiles back. Through thick and thin, they always have eachother, and it's good to see her. "I'm guessing we got an upgraded amp?" He makes a fist and nods, "And our bodies have been modified."

"Right in one, baby brother." Sara laughs at his glare, "Thousand years of evolution, we're just lucky we're able to stay in contact with earth to some degree."

"Yes, I'm impressed that you figured it out so quickly." Carlyle and the other doctor...Lexi, Scott is pretty sure, say together than glance at eachother before chuckling.

The second scan takes almost no time at all, and Sara and Scott are both cleared for active duty.

Scott doesn't expect many missions so soon--after all they have to set up the world, and the Nexus should have already prepped for all their needs and created a safety net with their personal.

Or at least that's what should have happened.

Two minutes outside of the Medic Bay and the intercoms come on, "The Ryder twins, get to the front of the ship, Pathfinders orders." A feminine voice.

Scott sighs, he knows that voice, "Cora."

"Yep," Sara shakes her head, ponytail swaying, "She's going to be something else on this mission."

"She's still Alec's second?" Scott doesn't particularly care who's his father's second, but he knows that if it's Cora...

"Unfortunately." Sara mutters and that's about when they reach the tram that will take them to the front of their ship. She presses a button to call it and glances back at Scott, "I'm not saying I don't want to start shit, but maybe don't start shit if there's other problems now?" Her mouth forms a smile, but it stretches at some scar tissue thanks to a Collector attack a year or two before Alec Ryder hatched this damn scheme.

"No promises," Scott teases just to see Sara roll her eyes. He grins and can feel his own scar tissue--right across his right eye, pull. Thankfully he hadn't lost the eye.

For a moment when silence fills the air between them, Scott worries that it'll be different. They _have_ been asleep for centuries, but..

It's normal.

Just like before they went into Cryo.

Being twins and siblings isn't a magical connection ( okay so their biotics can be augmented together but it's nothing to do with psychic connections or otherwise--anyone with a good trusting relationship can do it too) and they learned quickly that talking wasn't always necessary. To still have that is a blessing. Especially when both of them have to deal with their _father_.

Almost too soon the Tram stops and they walk shoulder to shoulder through the halls and up to the main bridge of the ship. It's rather large and comfy and Scott would be impressed but his eyes land on what's outside the ship.

"Holy smackerolls." Sara whispers.

"Comet?" Scott asks a second later.

"No, too much damage. A meteor? But..." Sara trails off and tilts her head looking intent.

"We don't have time for speculation." Alec Ryder interrupts turning to them.

With easy practice, Scott tilts his own head and continues where Sara left off, "Not a meteor, if it was that big it would have destroyed the whole planet. And there's still a green zone."

"Habitable zone, Scott, really." Sara's smiling though, and nodding, "I guess it had to be some kind of weapon."

"A good assessment, Sara, Scott." The Captain, Nozomi, says with a smile. There's also an amused sparkle in her eyes. She clearly has picked up on the animosity between the Ryder children and adult. "That's what the astronomers we have abroad are saying."

Alec presses his fingers against his nose, "I see a cryo sleep hasn't fixed this disobedience."

"Oh right, disobedience." Scott starts before a quick look from Sara settles him. Arguments for later then.

"Alec, we're here without any backup. We can't just rush onto that planet. Even if it's supposed to be our homeworld?" Sara asks Nozomi pointedly.

From the grinding of teeth, Alec definitely understood the slight.

"Yes, that should be our new home world. At least part of it is liveable from all scans, and even the naked eye can see the pools of fresh water and greenery, but the dead zone is very concerning." Nozomi glances at Alec, "Our pathfinder thinks we should check everything out _before_ we find the Nexus." From her tone it's clear what Nozomi thinks they should be doing.

"But we have a liveable zone! We came in late to our destination, who knows what the Nexus is like, or if they're even at our meeting point." Alec growls, biotics sparking.

Sara and Scott give eachother wary looks and without really mulling it over their biotics are primed. It won't be _great_ to have a fight on the bridge but better to be safe.

"Pathfinder, control yourself. I am still the Captain of the Hyperion." Nozomi snaps.

Alec's lips tighten, and his biotics settle once more, "It's something that _needs to be noted_."

"If you honestly think it will help our expedition." Nozomi says with a gust of breath.

"Good, Scott, Sara get ready. You'll have a team each." Alec snaps and leaves the Bridge.

"Can't wait." Scott mutters under his breath.

"Don't worry I'm sure he won't get us killed." Sara says dryly.

Nozomi shakes her head at them as the twins leave the Bridge to get ready.


	2. Chapter 2

"Really can't believe you talked to the Pathfinder like that." One of the team says.

Scott can't say which one they are, Fisher maybe? He doesn't usually work with others, maybe a two man squad if he was ever out of the field; he can say with certainty now that Fisher won't be his first choice.

"Progeny privilege," Sara says sweetly, before checking the safety of her gun, "I'm sure you understand, we know eachother and when to and not to argue about things."

"I still think you shouldn't have done it." Ah, Cora. Her stance is as hostile as her tone.

"Good thing it's already done." Scott says simply, and makes sure his helmet is the right size. They might be twins, but it doesn't mean their armor is the same size. Which means that he _always_ has to check to make sure someone didn't switch their gear or give him the same size as Sara.

Cora looks geared up to snap, her eyes narrowed.

"Ready?" Sara says, and tilts her head to the door.

"Yep." Scott pats himself down one more time. He's not thrilled with the Predator Series--supposedly it's been updated but since they don't have the materials for new upgrades that aren't essential, they've been left with the old guns--but it's better than the Tempest so he'll take it.

  
  


"Look at that little brother." Sara says.

Outside their respective jumpers are half molten rocks floating around the planet. Some have drifted close to the edge of the planet's gravity well. The planet itself looked half gray from the impact, several dozen of the rocks were no doubt from the impact and debris.

"Wonder how the rest of it is so green and wet." Scott mutters, eyeing the other part of the planet. While it looks habitable, they both have been through enough Alliance missions to know when shit looks too good to be true.

"Cut the chatter." Alec responds, sounding just as grumpy as he usually did.

A click and Sara's on their private channel, "Thousand year nap and he's still got a stick shoved up his ass."

"You're telling me." Scott sighs, and holds onto the Jumper seat when their pilot has trouble keeping a clear course.

While most of the debris has collected into natural satellites there are still fragments that make their kinetic shields take a beating, and their pilot is nothing like the one Scott remembers from his Alliance days. Steve Cortez had been a legend in the Alliance, and Scott can say that if the man hadn't been on _that_ mission that Sara and Scott would have a lot more than just some minor scar tissue across their faces.

"Landing." Their pilot says with no amount of relief.

"Good, you know your assignments, Ryders I expect you to lead your teams with professionalism and to not get them killed." Alec says into the radio before cutting off.

Scott doesn't need to be next to Sara to know she has the same exasperated and irritated expression on her face as he does. He shakes it off and checks his helmet one more time before they enter the atmosphere.

The descent is a rough one, filled with lots of dodging because if the space debris wasn't enough there are massive stone pillars floating in the air, and beasts the size of the jumper docilely flitting through the air.

Scott is _very_ relieved when they land on solid ground without a collision or loss of control. "Check your gear, and we'll survey the area, anyone know the cloaking tech?" He hasn't had a chance to see if their abilities have been improved or changed while in cryo, but he gets a few moments to go through his upgraded omni-tool and check his cloak tech. It looks familiar if vastly improved, and he has to take a moment to test it out just to make sure he can use it outside.

Really moving this fast when they're still unprepared for their new bodies and abilities is _so_ Alec Ryder it's almost insulting.

"Ready, Ryder." One of the team, Damon says minutes later.

Scott nods, he's almost envious of Sara for having Liam, the man seems like a fun partner to be around.The bright side is that he doesn't have Cora on his team either.

"Everyone else ready?" Scott asks just to make sure; he's had too many missions bungle because someone didn't speak up.

Fisher raises a hand and looks half sheepish. The man doesn't have his gear locked down.

Barely refraining from calling him out, Scott checks his biotics briefly. From the feel of a light _lift_ on a few of the extra bags in the back, it's almost too easy. He's going to have to relearn his control if he wants to be efficient again. But something else to focus on. He's really regretting letting his father dictate where and when they should go. But then, neither Scott or Sara would be in the Andromeda Galaxy if Alec Ryder hadn't ruined their chances in the Milky Way.

Out of the ship the air is filled with ash and soot. Smoke fills the area for at least a mile before there's any hint of blue skies. Though they're more of an Aquarmarine if Scott is being honest. "Guess we have a trek on for us, stay close, keep your shields up, make sure you don't step in any lava."

"Lava?" Fisher asks with a hint of doubt. "There can't be lava on the surface or the jumper would have detected it."

"Not under us, but nearby." Scott says dryly. He glances back, he really wishes he had a smaller team, but what's done is done. He has his four people and he will work with them no matter the disgruntlement. "Like I said stay close."

"How will that help?" The fourth companion, Jared Scott thinks is his name, asks.

"I'm a biotic, I can set local barriers around us." At least Scott _could_ before the modifications. Now he's a little more worried about setting them flying into the sky. But being in the air is an improvement over burning alive in lava.

"Huh, that's not in your file, says your an engineer." Jared says.

"My...file." Scott's pretty sure Jared isn't talking about his Alliance File because that's locked down and Alec sure as fuck doesn't have it.

"Yeah our Andromeda files." Damon adds helpfully.

"Ah, those." Scott has to catch up--really what was Alec thinking? He gets distracted from responding to Damon (are they a he, they, or she?) while hoping over several cooling magma streams. Thankfully they're small enough that it's easy enough but of course there's more, "Settle the chatter for now, we have things to do." He says and focuses on getting his team to relative safety of the green and brown land ahead of them.

  
  


It takes two hours to get to an area that's not molten rock or ash infused.

"Anything new to report?" Alec asks, it must be the fifth time he's asked in the last two hours.

"Other than it being finally breathable?" Scott retorts, double checking his omnitools readings. Oxygen is stronger here, and he's relieved to see some type of dark green, almost black, grass growing across the ground. Even a few straggly bushes though they're few and far between and remind Scott vaguely of Cacti and other hardy heat-resistant plants.

"Keep the sass, Scott, what about you Sara?" Alec sounds out of patience about now.

"A few space ships, from the scans, it's hard to tell." Sara sounds like she's only half paying attention, "They aren't made from an alloy I'm familiar with, but they use a lot of copper, which is...weird."

"Send the data over so Sam can look at it." Alec says.

"Oh, you mean the illegal AI, that Sam." Sara snaps, before taking an audible breath through the comms, "Sending the data over, sorry Sam."

"No offense taken, Sara." Sam's voice is warm, and as always their voice is hard to tell between femme and masculine, like a perfect blend of many voices but only coming out as _one_ voice.

"Some offense taken." Alec grumbles, "Keep looking, Ryder out."

"Shit, what's wrong with your family, man?" Fisher asks.

"Too much to go over right now. Keep moving, I want all of you to be careful. If there's spaceship parts laying about," A ding on Scott's omni-tool notifies him of a package of information sent by his sister, "keep an eye open for hostiles. Remember Citadel alien protocol."

A chorus of "Understood! Sir!" Fills the air before they start moving again, keeping sight lines between them all.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I rewrote this once, and I'm refraining from rewriting it again cuz I just want to get to the good world building (Cuz fuck you bioware why do you always do this with other races re: angaran, re: elves etc..) and Vidal/Scott portion of the fic.
> 
> Excuse any bad writing re:OCs I figure that there has to be more cuz Sara and Scott are both awake and active and I don't usually add OCs into a story where they'll be consistently around.

For a planet that has a space ship crash, Scott doesn't see many signs of life. There's trees, water, a few animals--though very rare--but outside of that. Not many people or signs of civilization. The tech they do find is estimated to be at least six hundred years old thanks to Scott's VI scanning the items and dating them. None of it is primitive but it certainly isn't the same tech as the info dump Sara sent over.

"I think I found something Ryder," Damon says, they are about two or so yards away from Scott, and looking down a dip that, from Scott's point of view, hides much of the next mile.

"Something? Big enough to bring the others in?" Scott asks, already taking careful and quiet steps towards Damon. The way they are hunched over and low to the ground worries Scott. Never a good sign when a soldier does that.

"Maybe." They whisper before kneeling. Damon takes another glance down into the valley.

Gigantic, is Scott's first thought, with another of those ships left dead in the middle. But that's not all--there are...aliens? with bipedal bodies and an odd skin tone. Most of the bones look bipedal too, skin, organs, and muscle gone. The few alive don't look like they're friendly to eachother or to the environment around themselves.

"They don't look...sapient." Damon says with a rather audible gulp.

Scott has to agree, maybe there's some intelligence behind those eyes and their armor is clearly advanced tech but. Their actions are more beast than humanoid. He doesn't even think a Krogan would act like that and he's seen Krogan take bites out of their enemies.

"What are you two doing?" Fisher's voice is too damn high. It projects and echoes into the valley. 

The closest of the foreign aliens must have damn good hearing. And eyesight.

"Dammit Fisher shutup!" Damon snaps back. Their pistol is already in hand and Scott is glad one of his team shows some sense.

"What? There's nothing here. Man we should head back to the ship and try somewhere else." Fisher continues talking and it's the worst time to be so loud.

In the Valley the walls look steep but apparently are no trouble for whatever the fuck Is climbing towards them at a remarkable speed. There's green froth at it's mouth and Scott is pretty sure it's not a welcoming sign.

"Everyone move back," Scott says. Grabbing his own pistol and readying himself.

Damon barely scuttles back before the damn thing is on them.

How it moved so fast is mystery to Scott. Until he sees the things legs and arms start changing and mutating, the steep hooves disappear and humanoid appendages with fingers and toes (though only three each) appear.

"Ah fuck," Damon says and starts shooting.

The bullets should do something, some damage but clearly even if these creatures aren't sapient anymore their armor works. Keeping a kinetic barrier that blocks most of Damon's shots.

Scott rushes forward, biotics coming easily to him, he's no vanguard like his sister but moving from one place to the next, letting his dark energy fold space and time is almost too easy with his upgraded amp and own prowess. His attack sends the creature flying and even before Scott recovers from the recoil and suddenness of his reappearance (had he always moved that fast?) he can see lumps where limbs were blown off.

"Damn Sir!" Jared exclaims in awe, his own gun firing at another of the beasts coming at them.

"Really wish we hadn't landed." Fisher says, and his own bullets fill the air on _another_ enemy coming from the valley, "This wouldn't have happened with Ryder Sr." He adds.

Refraining from pointing out that _Fisher_ is the one who stirred up the proverbial hornets nest, Scott _Warps_ the next creature, cutting into it's very molecules with his dark energy and doesn't realize just how strong his powers are until a typical _Warp_ rips the damn thing into non-existence. He can't even see a trace left behind that's visible to the naked eye.

The battle continues with Scott flitting through enemies with ease, his _Charge_ isn't his go-to, he works on _Cryo-Beam_ , and _Cryo-Blast,_ with a couple of _Throws_ and _Slams_ thrown in to cause _Cryo Explosions_ that fill the air with frost, ice, and frozen body parts.

It's almost surprising when the fight stops almost as soon as it began.

"Everyone still alive?" Scott asks, checking his armor and amp. Not even a hint of stress, even though he has never used that many _Throws_ and _Slams_ in such a short amount of time. He feels like he could go for another fight, hell, maybe a spar against a Krogan.

"Good," Damon answers, their gun is smoking, which probably means he ran out of heat sinks.

Fisher scowls at Scott, "I can't believe you got us into this mess. We could have all died." From a glance, and a brief check with Scott's omni-tool the man shows no signs of injury or harm.

"I think what you mean to say is thanks Ryder for not chewing me a new one for alerting the crazy, mutating, possible natives." Jared adds dryly, He groans and rubs at his side. "Other than a stitch from running backwards while one of those things tried to get me, I'm good too."

"Good, let's go away from this valley. No need to attract anymore of them to us." Scott leads again, and takes them around the Valley, it's a lot longer than just jump jetting down into it and crossing it, but he can still see some of those damn things in there. He also sees them _tear eachother apart_. It's vicious to watch, and Damon has to take a pause to throw up and cover the resulting mess so they aren't tracked. Considering the damn things apparently have great eyesight and hearing, it's a good choice.

Finally they reach a safe distance and a new part of the planet, that Scott takes a moment to dictate a report to Alec. Scott's not really interested in talking to his dad right now. In fact he would rather not.

  
  


Almost five hours and Scott has to admit the planet isn't bad. Sure half of it is part magma, and ashy, but the habitable zone is decent and Alec actually finds a good place far enough away from the _Valley_ that would be perfect for an outpost.

"Good work team. Back onto the Hyperion." Alec says, and then because it's never that easy, "Since Scott and Sara both think we should see the Nexus first, you can pick your team and head there." The _without us_ is pretty clear.

Sara and Scott give eachother another look. It's never easy when it comes to the Ryder 'patriarch' but it's hardly a bad thing. Getting out of the way and going to see what's up with the Nexus isn't bad at all. Now flying one of the many space ships the Hyperion has for just such a situation is a little difficult. But thankfully, Jared is a pilot, "Oh yeah, it's in the family." He says, and it's not until Scott is reading over the files of his new team; Liam, Damon, Jared, and Sara's latest, Trix a soldier who had almost not made the cut with vibrant pink hair, that Scott realizes the man is a fucking _Cortez_.


End file.
